Never Let You Go
by SabaceanBabe
Summary: You run as fast as you can to the cold room, hoping beyond hope that you’ll be able to intercept him...


**Never Let You Go**

by SabaceanBabe

Rating: PG

Word count: 1,338

Disclaimer: Farscape belongs to tons of people and entities who are not me. No copyright infringement is intended, nor is any profit being made.

Author's notes: This fic is the result of intense boredom a couple days ago. I requested fic ideas. This one came from kazbaby. She asked me to "rewrite" her fic Coming Back to You as seen through Aeryn's eyes. This is my attempt at that. Feedback, as always, is appreciated, if you feel so moved. Kazzie, I hope you like it.

xxx

Your husband has gone to check on a minor power drain, according to Pilot. A power drain in the cold room, where Scorpius had kept you alive so many cycles before, when the heat delirium held you in its grip. Pilot doesn't know how long ago he'd gone to check; it hadn't seemed important enough to him to take note. But it's very important to you, the most important thing in the universe save one – John Crichton.

You run as fast as you can to the cold room, hoping beyond hope that you'll be able to intercept him, to stop him from going there, where he hasn't been since before the war. Moya's warm and accepting corridors pass by you in a blur of gold and brown, light and dark, and you put on more speed, even though you know in your heart that it is far too late.

The door to the cold room stands open, misty vapor caused by cold air meeting warm snaking and curling into the corridor. You feel the chill of it on your bare arms, the flesh pimpling with a cold that will never be banished.

His back is to you, strong and straight as ever and yet somehow diminished, bowed but not quite broken.

"Who?" he says, his voice as cold and lifeless as the room itself.

There is no real choice but to answer him and you take a step toward him. "You."

He flinches as though you've struck him and in a way, you suppose you have. "I'll ask again." He angles his body slightly toward you, just enough for you to see his jaw working, the flash of one too-bright blue eye. "Who?"

Suddenly you feel as though your knees will not, cannot support you and you lean against the doorway, bringing your head to rest against Moya's warm skin. You shiver and there is no way to tell if it's the result of the cold creeping into your skin from the room or the cold creeping into your soul from the man who stands lost not a metra from you. You feel a sob gather in the back of your throat, but you swallow it. There is no use in second guessing what you've done. There is no use in tears or recriminations.

"Is it…?" he begins, but the question trails off, unfinished.

You know what he's asking and there is at least some small comfort that you can give him. "No, it's not."

He jumps at the straw you've given him. "I know. I know, it's just…"

There is fear in his voice, a fear you've not heard from him since you left Moya, left him and the memories that you couldn't face while he was there, reminding you every day, every arn, every microt of what you'd lost.

Reacting to that fear now, you cross the room, stopping only when you're beside him. You don't look at the man in the glass coffin, only at the vibrant, vital man standing next to you as he searches your face for something that he can hold onto.

"This is you, John. Has been since you stopped the war." Your face feels as though it will crack any microt, your heart feels as though it's shattering even as you continue. "I just couldn't…" Your voice does crack and you reach out for John's hand where it rests on the cold, cold glass. You place his palm against his chest, feel the beat of his heart through the contact. "You were still in there, trapped. It was no different than the living death, and I couldn't end it. End us. End our family."

For days you had watched him as he lay in that bed, blue eyes staring at nothing, responding to nothing. You tried everything to break through whatever barrier had formed in his mind, but nothing… not you, not your son, nothing could penetrate that wall.

"What am I then?" There is anguish in his voice as he pulls his hand from yours, pulls your body close to his. "What did you do?"

You feel his hands on your shoulders, feel the heat of him slowly seep into your muscles. And you know that there is no turning back. He has to know; you must tell him.

"It was like the living death, John. Your body had fallen into an endless sleep from which you couldn't wake. I did all that I could, watched for as long as I could. Nothing changed. Days turned to weekens and then monens. The peace treaties had been signed, but as the war grew more distant and still no one had word of you…" His fingers tighten on your shoulders, almost to the point of pain.

"I had no choice. I knew there was one man who could help me, who could keep those warring factions from tearing at each other again. To keep the fragile peace you won, I did what I had to do." His eyes bore into you, begging you to deny it, begging you to tell him that this was all some nightmare from which he waken soon. But instead, you give him the truth.

"Scorpius knew of a way to bring you back to me. To those who needed you. He created a bioloid body, found a way to stream your consciousness from the broken shell in which you were trapped into _this_ body." The shock of your words take him as you watch and the light that blazed in his eyes fades. His hands drop to his sides and he seems to fall in on himself.

Unable to bear the aura of defeat that surrounds him, you reach up, touch the face that is so dear to you. You feel the faint stubble there. "Your body is a construct, John, but that part of you that makes you _you_… That part is here, just as it has been for all the cycles since you stopped the war."

John shakes his head and turns from you, turns toward the glass coffin and the man within it, falls to his knees. You slowly drop down beside him. You can't tell if John is really seeing the man encased in the glass, but you see him. Just as you've seen him every day for the past ten cycles – the pale skin, the slack face, the brown hair with streaks of gray.

You start at the feel of John's arm as he snakes it around your shoulders. You feel it as his fingers stroke through the hair at the back of your head, tangling in the long strands. He turns your head toward him and pulls you in close. His mouth comes down on yours hard, desperate, but then he breaks away.

"End it, Aeryn. End this. End _him_. End me." You close your eyes at the hurt and fear in his voice, but still the words come, raining down on you like stones. "You made me promise you once that I'd end your life if the living death ever took you. It's the least you can do for me now."

Your head tells you that he's right. You know that he would never have wanted this, to be alive and yet not. Your head tells you this, but your heart tells you something else.

Calmly you stand. You look down at John Crichton where he sits on the floor of the cold room, leaning against the glass coffin that contains John Crichton. He looks up at you, shaking, and more words escape his lips. "I've loved you so much, Aeryn. So much. And our son…"

There is more, but you can no longer hear him. You take the brief steps that bring you to the coffin and its precious, lifeless cargo. You open the panel in the side, push the buttons that initiate the sequence even as you loosen your pulse pistol in its holster…

Just as you have always done, you'll do what you have to do.


End file.
